Jaroslav Halak wore number 41 while playing goaltender for the St. Louis Blues in the 2010/2011 NHL season. His salary for the season was reportedly $2,750,000. The total team salary for the St. Louis Blues was reportedly $34,350,000, so his salary represented 8.0% of that total team payroll. We can compare his salary to the other players on his team. The median salary for a player on the St. Louis Blues was $885,000, while the average salary was $1,635,714. He played a total of 57 games that season, with 0 goals and 0 assists - a total of 0 points. If we divide his reported salary by the number of games played, we find he earned $48,245.61 per game played. Jaroslav Halak had a plus/minus of 0, 6 PIM (penalties in minutes), 0 PP (power play goals), 0 SH (short-handed goals), 0 GWG (game winning goals), and took 0 shots. He had a shooting percentage in the 2010/2011 season of 0.00%. His goaltending statistics include 3294 min, 1518 SA (shots against), 136 GA (goals against), 2.48 GAA (goals against average), 91.00% save percent, and a record of 27-21-7, including 7 shutouts. We can divide his salary by the number of shots against, if we want to try to evaluate his performance strictly as a goaltender. His salary per shot against was $1,812.

But then, there are taxes. Each hockey season is played during two calendar years, however, given an annual salary in the U.S. of $2,750,000 we can estimate that he would have to pay $937,784 in federal income taxes. That is about the same amount of tax as the tax paid by 115 median high school teachers, 131 median police officers, or 186 median fire fighters. After paying the IRS, he would have $1,812,216 left over. However, he may still have to use some of that money to pay state or city taxes as well.

About the author

Author: Mark McCracken is a corporate trainer and author living in Higashi Osaka, Japan. He is the author of thousands of online articles as well as the Business English textbook, "25 Business Skills in English".